Zerkall Mill shutting down

Just heard on the Suntup presentation today that the Zerkall mill is shutting down - no more Zerkall mouldmade. It seems like Zerkall is a popular mouldmade paper in the fine press world - more so than (say) Rives, Magnani and so on. Anyone have any idea why Zerkall is so widely used? Not the biggest fan of it myself, as other mouldmade papers have a better hand feel to me.

Oh, wow, that is very unfortunate. Did the presentation indicate why it is shutting down? Covid? Declining demand? etc.

>2 ultrarightist: - The closure is as a result of damage to the mill & machinery sustained during the massive flooding that occurred this past summer.

>3 jeremyjm: I see. Thank you. Very unfortunate, indeed. I'm guessing that their insurance did not sufficiently cover the damages.

>1 punkzip: "the Zerkall mill is shutting down - no more Zerkall mouldmade."

Is this the wording Paul used? Not a Suntup collector, so not sure I can make it through the 30+ minute video, but if truly permanently shutting down and not just temporarily due to the damages they've already shared about, this is a big deal!

>5 NathanOv: Your questions are always hilarious.

At the bottom of this listing it seems to corroborate this:

“The mill was destroyed by a flood in 2021 and will not be reopening. Stock of this special paper is limited.”

https://georgehillco.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=228

That's a real shame given their long history; I've always been impressed how Zerkall paper is so widely used as it is in the fine press industry despite being so seemingly antiquated an operation as to not even have a website. That said, as strange as it sounds, I'm also not going to exactly miss Zerkall either given that 7/10 of my small collection of fine press volumes seem to use Zerkall. I hope other mills like Hahnemüle and Magnani step in to fill the gap as I've found their papers to be much more appealing.

A local German newspaper, Aachener Nachrichten, has published an article about this. It appears to be true that the machine producing Zerkall mouldmade paper will not be restored.

While the damage due to flooding is the direct cause of the shut down, it appears that there is also a lack of demand. The article states that the German government would have provided a grant covering up to 80% of the repair cost, but the owner would have had to guarantee operation until at least 2023. They did not want to commit to this due to the loss of their biggest customer.

If the company will continue to operate, it will produce to-go food containers made of cellulose, and even that is currently not certain.

Damn, that's a shame.

The question remains why Zerkall was so commonly used. If it was greater capacity than other mills the closure does not bode well - at least in the short term - for fine press world.

Their biggest customer which they lost I presume was Folio Society.

>11 punkzip: "Their biggest customer which they lost I presume was Folio Society."

Did FS use Zerkall for any titles other than the Letterpress Shakespeare?

>11 punkzip: I don't know about the FS for their biggest customer, at least recently. I may be missing some but the only books I have that used Zerkall mouldmade were the letterpress Shakespeare printed long ago and one page of the Wind in the Willows LE. I don't think any of the other FS LEs I have used it but I suppose there are more?

I assume their mouldmade customers came more from the private press world like Arion, etc.

>11 punkzip: Per the comment by handandeye here, a reason for the popularity was the lower price in comparison to other mouldmade papers.

>12 ultrarightist:

The letterpress war poets - Brooke, Thomas, and Owen - are also on Zerkall

>15 affle: Those are a little older, relatively (a few years?), but with those large limitations would have been pretty big sources of revenue for them, even infrequently.

I wonder if it’ll disrupt any upcoming LEs we don’t yet know about.

>11 punkzip:
Biggest customer may not have been a book publisher. Nice paper has plenty of other uses (e.g. labels, linings, premium notebooks).

This is sad news indeed. Zerkall is my favourite paper as it provides, at least to me, a perfect balance between something special that befits a private press and something that is also practical and a pleasure to handle as part of a book. Thanks goodness that La Papeterie Sanit-Armand in Montreal (Quebec, Canada) is still around. (Mad Parrot Press’ “The Wind in the Willows” was printed on their paper.) I have always loved their (Saint-Armand) paper; however, find it just a fraction too thick - works great for a large format books (such as TWITW), but not as good for smaller formats.

>13 jveezer: are we certain that their biggest customer was even a book maker?

My understanding is that the bulk of letterpress printing is still for goods such as wedding invitations, stationary, business cards, and labels for premium packaging.

I don't really have data though, so maybe someone else with more experience will weigh in.

(Edit: and I see >17 Raenas: made the same point earlier. That's what I get for responding before reading to the end of the thread.)

According to this blogpost from Hand and Eye, Joe Blundell (Folio Society publishing director) actually chose Magnani for Letterpress Shakespeare, but there was an industrial dispute at the time so it could not be used. It was then between Somerset and Zerkall, with Zerkall winning out only because of the number/location of the deckle edges. So Zerkall was not FS's first choice, and they may have switched to another mill for future projects - this leads to me suspect that FS was the major customer they lost and that Magnani will be FS's future mouldmade paper provider. I don't know the situation for the War Poets LEs though. https://handandeye.wordpress.com/the-letterpress-shakespeare-from-matrix-27/

This is very sad news for me.

If I look at some of the nicest books I have bought or read in the last year:
Whittington Press: Venice, Britten's Aldeburgh, Midwinter, Whittington - Aspects of a Cotswold Village
Nomad Letterpress: Coastline, 2020 Vision
Fleece Press: A Lakeland Diary
Gahenna Press: The Defense of Gracchus Babeuf
Midnight Paper Sales: A House in the Country
(not to mention my belove Letterpress Shakespeare editions).

They were all printed on paper from Zerkall. I also have a (now small-looking) pile of blank sheets of Zerkall that I use for my own experiments in printmaking. I even created a tag for the paper on my blog because it seemed like a real mainstay of my collection.

Of course, there are other fine papers out there--doubtless even better papers. But I'm sad to lose what seems like an old friend.

>21 ubiquitousuk: Maybe that can be a topic for one of your new Youtube videos (always enjoyable to watch by the way).

>22 wongie: Thanks for the kind words and suggestion. I'm thinking of ways to diversify the content beyond my regular book reviews, so this is definitely one for consideration.

That is bad news indeed; I have used Zerkal almost exclusively for forty years so this is a blow. I recently ordered 500 sheets so I must make them last.

The Zerkall papers were indeed cheaper which is why I think many editions were printed on their stocks. Many of the papers were not 100% cotton but high alpha cellulose or a mix of the two which is one of the reasons I rarely used them in my books. Fabriano has been on the endangered species list for awhile now. Somerset and Rives mills seem to be doing ok but they have strong markets in making papers for the glicee scene. Real photo paper is even more scarce.

Fine art paper mills have been dropping like flies, artists are creating fewer works on paper for one thing and digital everything is king. Even 20 years ago there were many more choices and actual brick and mortar paper stores to purchase from. I can't even think of one that has survived internet sales in the midwest. The days of going through a stack of marbled sheets to find matching sets is gone I'm afraid unless you visit the makers studio.

>24 AndyEngraver: where do you order from? I’m planning on taking up Engraving soon, with Zerkall being so prominently used in relief, I would like to acquire some before it’s all gone.

>26 Esoterics: I should stress that I can find nothing about the demise of Zerkall apart from what has been mentioned in this thread. I am in the UK and use John Purcell Papers in London as a mail order provider. There are other alternatives but I am so used to Zerkall now. Where are you based> If in North America, I would join the Wood Engraver's Network - such an encouraging and supportive group. They use many papers, including Mohawk. Good luck with the engraving - I would be happy to answer questions that arise.

>27 AndyEngraver: Translating from the German Wikipedia page for Zerkall (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zerkall): "Zerkall is known for its paper mill, where paper has ben manufactured since the end of the 19th century. Since 1920, mould-made paper has been exported globally under the trade mark ZERKALL-BÜTTEN. This is a major source of employment in the region and is led by the Renker family. In April 2021 the factory was taken over by Frank Fèron of Düren. In December 2021 it was announced that the production of mould-made paper would cease on account of the flooding."

There's also a link there to this news article: https://www.aachener-zeitung.de/lokales/dueren/huertgenwald/das-weltbekannte-bue..., where the title translates to "The world-renowned mould-made paper from Zerkall is history".

So what are the effects of the end of Zerkall mouldmade? From the customer perspective, if Zerkall was so widely used because it was inexpensive, we can expect increased prices, and probably longer delays (on top of existing supply chain issues) for fine press books as paper must be sourced from other mills which may or may not have the necessary stock in the short term.

>25 DWPress: Dolphin Papers in Franklin, Indiana.

https://store.dolphinpapers.com/decorative-papers/marbled-papers/momi-marbled/

I use enough quantity these days I buy paper directly from the importers at a fair rate in quantities of 100 unless it's custom made as in the case of TWitW. Here in the USA that would be Legion Paper in NY and Atlantic Papers in PA for western style papers. Anybody else selling these stocks in the states are reselling it through them.

I make my own marbled sheets now or create patterned paper with printing for most of my endpapers. But love pawing through piles when I can and have quite a stash in my own cabinets of decorative papers I've picked up during past 30 years. The last book, Kafka's In the Penal Colony, standard edition cover paper was made by Fabriano and discontinued in the 60s. It's fun to be able to hold stocks in quantities for awhile for just the right project.

I first heard about the Zerkall problems through other printers here and in Europe but haven't personally seen anything in the media.

And I'll second Andy's recommendation to check out The Wood Engravers Network too! The Guild of Book Workers is also another organization whose focus in part is in education and a continuation of traditional skills and knowledge. Between these two organizations there's a good chance a member had something to do with any contemporary fine/private press book in your collections.

In my humble opinion, the closing of Zerkall's mouldmade operation is the worst blow to fine press since I've started collecting.

Anybody here who subscribed to No Reply's "A Scandal in Bohemia" has unfortunately already experienced at least one delay caused by the mill's shutdown.

It looks like there's been some praise for Zerkall based on cost, but I don't think there's any hard and fast rule about the cost of mouldmades vis-a-vis each other. I've noticed that in the U.K. (where Andy and Phil are based) its significantly cheaper than in the U.S. I recall Phil mentioning that it costs him ~$1.5 per 21x30" sheet whereas here it's closer to $5 (unfortunately!!!). I imagine the closer you get to the source, and the fewer national boundaries you cross, the cheaper it gets.

The real standouts for Zerkall-bütten in my opinion:

It's a joy to print on. Great balance between softness (which makes for lovely impression) and hardness (which helps the impression stay even).

The parent sheets are smaller. A Zerkall parent sheet is usually 21x30 whereas, say, Hahnemüle is ~30x40. That means more deckle edges!

The watermark is clear, distinct, but unobtrusive. Personally I find the Arches and Stonehenge watermarks a little bit too much, whereas the Zerkall (whether the Z imprint or the lion figure) is really tasteful.

Zerkall produced a wide variety of papers, ranging from thin laid to thick wove and everything in-between, which were ALWAYS reliable. I think Hanhemüle comes next closest with their bugra and biblio lines, but still, in my experience Zerkall papers are simply always a joy no matter which is used.

As others here have indicated, Zerkall's biggest client was certainly not a fine press at all. In fact, I think we vastly overestimate the footprint of fine press within the greater world of book arts, let alone fine arts in general. I once spoke on the phone with a representative from Hanhemüle who was delighted to hear about our handmade books — he wasn't aware that such a thing still existed. Zerkall's biggest clients were probably art supply distributors and maybe corporate entities. For the longest time, Thornwillow's handmade paper was made primarily for luxury brands like Montblanc and Cartier. It seems that wedding invitations are the lifeblood of letterpress today.

Like Chad, I'm really saddened by the disappearance of local paper stockists. I wouldn't be surprised if we saw a continued decline. That said, Zerkall was a much smaller operation than say, Arches, Hanhemüle, and Stonehenge, which I think are a bit more immune to disaster because of their already wide distribution. You'll find all three of these in any art store in America, whereas you'd almost never see Zerkall.

RIP Zerkall 📜

>1 punkzip: I print intaglio prints and photogravures, and Zerkall Copperplate is extremely sensitive to all the subtle differences in aquatint tones due to its being a waterleaf paper. It is by far the most sensitive paper for intaglio printing

Stonehenge paper has too much calcium carbonate in it to print intaglio prints with subtle differences in them.
Hahnemuhle Copperplate and Somerset are good, and Arches would be a possible fourth in line, but nothing was as sensitive as Zerkall. What a loss.

>35 hollymo: So for you it's more about the ingredients of the paper than how the paper is made (hand, mould, machine), correct?

We've lost so many amazing papers, the most recent victim was Domestic Etch which was a brilliant, cheap proofing paper. I didn't use Zerkall very much because most of it was a high alpha cellulose mix and I always prefer 100% (non tree) plant fibers.

I do a lot of mezzotints and roulette work so a smooth surface and really absorptive cotton with very little internal or surface sizing is ideal for this work though this stuff is terrible for books - you breath on it and it leaves a mark. So yes, paper ingredients, sizings and fillers matter quite a bit depending on what your intended use is.

>35 hollymo: hollymo: try the hot pressed Pescia, some of the Velké Losiny papers, or Rives BFK with a very long soak time.